Kiki's Delivery Service (1989)

 Hayao Miyazaki movie about a 13 year old witch who starts a buisness, rescues a friend from a dirigable accident, and learns to believe in her self. Sweet natured film, set in the 1950's. Late 90's English dub has Kirsten Dunst as Kiki and Phil Hartman as her cat. ***

Aline (2022)

'Aline' is an unauthorized and lightly fictionalized musical bio-pic of the singer Celine Dion, but they can't use her name so here she's called 'Aline Dieu'. This French-Canadian production is co-written by, directed, and stars Valérie Lemercier, the 57 year old plays her character form the ages of 6 to 48 by way of somewhat disconcerting visual effects. Truly a labor of love this big budget fan film is an extremely earnest hagiography of the Quebec born super star. It is ridiculous but it is also (in my estimation) the greatest bad musical bio-pic ever made. 

There is something inherently campy and outsized about Celine Dion's life, so I find it hard to imagine a better bio-pic about her. The film is bizarre, a truly unique vision, yet also extremely conventional in structure and employing the clichés of it's genre. Celine never had a drinking or drug problem, nor apparently was she difficult to work with, so the main conflicts of the picture are infertility issues, a multi month period where he voice gave out, and the 26 year age difference between her and the love of her life producer she'd known since she was 12. Extremely difficult to rate, this a sublime film, so off kilter that it achieves a kind of greatness. Somewhere between 1 1/2 and 4 stars. 

Dragon Seed (1944)

 In 'Dragon Seed' Hollywood stars Katharine Hepburn, Walter Huston, Henry Travers, Agnes Moorhead and others appear in yellowface as the residents of a Chinese village standing up to it's Japanese occupiers. One wouldn't and shouldn't make a film this way today and it was problematic even at the time, but while 'The Good Earth' was able to ring some real pathos out of similar casting conventions 13 years earlier, 'Dragon Seed' fails to do so. Ms. Hepburn is particularly ill cast, the 37 year old Connecticut WASP is suppose to be a 20ish Chinses peasant girl, her husband is played by Turhan Bey, at 22 appropriate in age for his part, but of Turkish and Czech-Jewish origin. Ill conceived, overlong (around 2 and a half hours) and under cooked, this movie is supposed to be about strong feelings, but hardly invoked a one in me. **

The Jerk (1979)

 Steve Martian's first staring role, film has a lose plot that strings together some of Martian's old comedy bits along with some new material curtesy of Carl Gottlieb and others. A consistently funny and very quotable film, also very 1970's, you might be hard pressed to make this movie today. Bernadette Peters plays the love interest, and gets to sing a bit too. ***

Splendor in the Grass (1961)

In 'Splendor in the Grass' social expectations tear at high school sweethearts Natalie Wood and Warren Beatty in 1920's Kansas. Written for the screen by Pulitzer Prize winning playwright William Inge, directed by Elia Kazan doing a fair George Stevens impression. Some good stuff here, a somewhat duller then expected melodrama. Beatty's screen debut, Wood is lovely and talented, while Pat Hingel chews the scenery with aplomb as the formers father, uniformly good supporting work. ***

Shadow of the Thin Man (1941)

 Nick and Nora and a mystery involving a string of murders related to fixing sporting events for gambling purposes. Donna Reed guest stars. Film is better then it's immediate predecessor, gets the balance of mystery and humor right. ***

Castle in the Sky (1986)

 'Castle in the Sky' is a steampunk anima by Hayao Miyazaki where a pubescent boy and girl go in search of a mythical floating city, and are pursued by both pirate's and their own government. I watched the English dub from the turn of the millennium. One of the directors more overtly juvenile targeted films, it still displays his wonderful mythic sense and great originality. Cloris Leachman's casting as Captain Dula is about as perfect as can be.  ***1/2

Shopgirl (2005)

 'Shopgirl' is a 2005 movie based on Steve Martin's 2000 novella of the same name. It is the story of a 25 year old clerk (Clare Danes) in the glove department of the Los Angeles Sack's 5th Avenue, who finds her self present with two potential romantic suiters, a poor man her age (Jason Swartzmen) and a rich man twice it (Steve Martian). This movie is both more then that brief summation might imply, and also a delightfully simple tale. I was just thoroughly charmed by this thing. To be featured in more detail on the podcast. ***

Oscar Wilde (1960)

'Oscar Wilde' was along with 'The Trials of Oscar Wilde', one of two films about the authors 1895 "homosexuality trails" to come out in 1960. I found out after I started watching that this is considered the lesser of the two films. Surprisingly dull for a movie about a famously witty man. 

Wilde was 40 when the trials where held, Robert Morley 28 when he first played the part on the stage, here he is 52 and arguably looks older. This movie was made too late, but also couldn't have been made much earlier when the production code still had a full set of teeth. **

Alias John Preston (1955)

 Psychologist Alexander Knox helps businessman Christopher Lee with troubling dreams that touch on a past he refuses to deal with. Both Knox and Lee are in top form, Betta St. John, who is still with us at 92 plays the love interest. Knox doesn't even show up until about half way through the film, yet I felt his presence dominating Lee's, though Lee again is quite good here. This isn't a long picture, about 70 minutes, but the films first half seems wandering, if "Alias" wasn't in the title you wouldn't know where it was going. **1/2 

Sign of the Ram (1948)

 Susan Peters (1921-1952) was an Oscar nominee at 21. She had a very healthy career going before being paralyzed in a hunting accident on New Years Day 1945. She did stage work, made this one last film, and even had an early TV series before committing suicide at age 31. Sad story, looking online there were all these pictures of her full of life and showing off her legs. 

So I was really rooting for this one but it's not good. Low energy melodrama that feels more like a stage play then a movie. Peters plays a woman paralyzed saving the lives of her stepchildren, only to become a paranoid and manipulative bitch. Bosley Crowther really laid into this one in The New York Times, I'd have to agree with him. A faux gothic novel of a story, I've seen similar types of tales done much better. *1/2 

The Sleeping Tiger (1954)

Convinced he can cure him, psychologist Alexander Knox takes his attempted mugger Dirk Bogard into his home for treatment. The troubled youth proceeds to have an affair with the doctors wife Alexis Smith. It occurs to me that this movie can be described as an erotic thriller. The film goes a little too over the top a little too often. **

Fascism on a Thread: The Strange Story of Nazi Exploitation Cinema (2019)

 Documentary on one of the odder exploitation sub genera's, one that reached its peak of production and popularity in the mid to late 70's. Many of these films were Italian made. I'd actually only seen one before, 'Women's Camp 119', but if your going to see one that is one that hits most of the major clichés and tropes of the genera. Also it was directed by Bruno Mattei, so double Italian exploitations film points. Doc has some neat stories, interesting information and a decent enough group of talking heads. ** 

Some films featured: Kapo, The Dammed, The Night Porter, Women's Camp 119, the Ilsa movies, Cabaret, Salo, Salon Kitty, and The Beast in Heat. 

  

Princess Mononoke (1997)

25th anniversary of this film, the Japanese version, the English dub came out two years later. This was back in the theaters the other week and I had planned to see it but other things interfered. So I decided that I'd watch this and a few other of the Miyazaki classics I hadn't seen before in the coming weeks. These movies are kind of hard to get at now, I think they are exclusively through HBO Max, otherwise you have to buy them for like $20 dollars, for me that is to much for a digital copy, so taking advantage of old school DVD Netflix, yes I still subscribe to that service. However this film is very good, I wish I had seen it at the theater. 

The story is about a conflict between God's and men, there is a heavy environmental bent to the film, which seems fairly common to Miyazaki. Also common to Miyazaki is there isn't a traditional villain, here we have a group of players with various sometimes overlapping, sometimes competing agendas and priorities. Again with Miyazaki there is a very developed sense to the mythological world, despite its being basically original. I marvel at the mans ability to construct worlds, and this is a fascinating one. The story well constructed, it hits all the epic and mythic beats it needs to hit. Excellent voice cast as well. Really a joy to watch, I hope to revisit. ****

The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933)

 Bio-pic of the British monarch focus on his many marriages. 'The Private Life of Henry VIII' was the first non American film to win an Academy Award, Charles Laughton as best actor in the lead role. This was also the first British film to be nominated for best picture and the 12th most successful movie at the American box office in 1933, making producer Alexander Korda a real player in international cinema for the next twenty years. 

Korda's future wife Merle Oberon plays wife #2 Anne Boleyn, while Laughton's only wife Elsa Lanchester plays wife #4 Anne of Cleves, and their few dryly funny scenes together are the best in the film. The movie makes Henry out to be a blustery but surprisingly sympathetic figure, and as much play as Henry has been given over the years there's not been a more iconic portrayal of the man. Well paced and at 97 minutes in length the film doesn't overstay its welcome, which was my principle concern going in. ***

Father Stu (2022)

 'Father Stu' is based on the true story of Stuart Long, a Montana based boxer turned Roman Catholic priest. After a jaw injury ended his boxing career Stuart moved to California in hopes of launching a new life as an actor. He got a few bit parts in things but largely supported himself through more conventional work. After being nearly killed in a motorcycle accident, Stuart reassessed his life and converted to Catholicism at the urging of his Roman Catholic girlfriend. They planed to marry but unexpectedly Stuart found himself feeling called to the priesthood. While in seminary he was diagnosed with Inclusion Body Myositis a rare autoimmune disease similar in symptoms to ALS or Lou Gehrig's Disease. Stuart completed his course work and was ordained a priest, he died at age 50 in 2014.

While Stuart had many difficulties in his life the film seems to play them up further and maybe even add some. In the movie he lost a younger brother at the age of six, I haven't been able to find anything online indicating that this really happened. Stuart was also more successful in his pre conversion life then the movie shows, he was a college graduate with a degree in English literature and managed a Pasadena art museum for seven years. Mark Wahlberg plays him as more or less a lunkhead. 

Stuart overcomes so many things in this movie that had the name not already been used by another Christian film a good alternate title here would be 'Overcomer'. This picture does work as a conversion story, it's nicely paced, relaxed in tone, and interestingly not over preachy, it plays more like an inspiring sports movie then pious hagiography. In fact it probably sets a record for F-bombs dropped in a Christian movie. At one point David O. Russell was set to write and direct. 

Winning supporting turns by Teresa Ruiz as Stu's girlfriend, and the always great Jackie Weaver as his mom. Mel Gibson plays Stuart's dad and I again ask myself how this man is still making movies. Devout Catholicism seems to be a major driver for Wahlberg's and Gibson's presence in the film. Gibson's daughter in law Annet Mahendru appears in the film, in vision as the virgin Marry. 

An uneven picture but on the whole I enjoyed it, Mark Wahlberg gives an extremely invested performance and along with some solid supporting work and a gruffer then normal tone for a Christian film, that pretty much carries it. **1/2

Witchcraft '70 (1970)

 'Witchcraft '70' is a "gonzo documentary" on witchcraft, the occult, new age hippie cults, and for some reason cryonics. For those who don't know the "gonzo documentary" is a genera that grew out of Italy, this film for example is Italian, that presents sensationalistic and fictional material in a faux documentary format. So in 'Witchcraft '70' they will present scenes from a naked Satanist wedding ceremony, but there will be 'journalistic style' narration played over it so as to provide you the veneer of an excuse for watching it, this isn't prurient, this is serious news I need to know about this. 

This film itself however hardly even bothers to keep up the pretense after the first twenty minutes or so, because everyone "interviewed", regardless of where in the world they are supposed to be from, is speaking fluent Italian. The film seems to have appropriated footage from other projects because there are sequences with the Krishna's or Anton LeVay that feel lifted from semi legitimate journalist or documentary efforts. Every bit of audio in this is dubbed over, there is no real ambient noise anywhere in this thing. 

The movie's not good, but it's interesting as a curiosity. **

Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022)

 'Everything Everywhere All at Once' is an extremely difficult film to kind of boil down into a brief description. It's about the multiverse, and family relationships, and taxes, and hot dog fingers, and 'The Matrix', and misunderstanding the titles of Pixar movies. Writer directors Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert come form a music video background and their one previous film project together was 2016's 'Swiss Army Man', in which a marooned Paul Dano rides Daniel Radcliffe's farting corpse back to civilization. So think surreal going in. 

Like their previous film 'Everywhere' can be a bit much, and I found it kind of grating early on. It was a 'where the hell is this going' film viewing experience. But as it developed and I started to get more of an idea of what the director/writers were trying to do I came to apricate it more. It is extremely strange, very creative, and sublimely surreal at times. There's a lot of showiness to this whole thing, but ultimately there is a point behind it, and more of a point then 'Swiss Army Man' had. 

The whole construction of the piece, which at times feels hap hazard, I would have to describe as intricate. The central performances by Michelle Yeoh, Stephanie Hsu, and Johnathan Ke Quan are all good, and Jamie Lee Curtis is a national treasure. Not for everyone, but I'd give it ***

X (2022)

 A24 is an interesting production company. One of the things they are most known for is "arty" horror movies, of which 'X' qualifies. It's a tribute to 70's slasher films, and is set in Texas in the summer of 1979. Six mostly young people rent a cottage at an isolated farm for a night, to film scenes for a low budget porno movie, and things turn into a low budget horror movie.

Directed by Ti West, whose being making horror films (none of which I've seen) for more then 15 years, you can tell his affection for the troupes, he executes everything just a little better then he really needs to. The characters in the movie are tying, in the thinking of the film nerd/cinematogrpaher character, to make a well made porno, and this is a well made horror movie. Just different enough, just intriguing enough, just exploitive enough, to rise above its competition, and make it a contemporary horror film I found worth seeing in a theater. 

Perhaps the most interesting thing about this film is its killer, again just different enough to be intriguing, the film ends with a teaser for the prequel origin story for this character, and I might actually see that in the theater as well. ***

Night School (1981)

 Someone is going around and chopping the heads off Boston co-eds, a Harvard educated detective and his streetwise Armenian-American partner investigate. There is a philandering anthropologist, a sexy but high strung British teachers assistant, and a predatory lesbian dean. Oh, and we get a scene where a head is found in some soup. It's not great, and if anything it gets less good as it goes on, but what endeared me to it, and it's something that could just of likely turned me off, is how it was stimulatingly trying to be two incompatible things. This movie wanted to be both a psychological thriller of some sophistication and insight, and cheesy exploitive slasher film, the shifts between these tones amused me, but could just as likely pissed me off. I was obviously in the right movie for this when I saw it. **

The Man from Utah (1934)

 'The Man from Utah' is an early John Wayne, poverty row western. Wayne's film persona was not fully formed yet, so film (briefly) experiments with the then popular 'singing cowboy' bit, of course they had to dub The Duke. Plot concerns a gang of bank robbers trying to... well, rob banks, but also rig a rodeo competition. Wayne is a ringer brought in by a Marshall to mess with the bad guys scheme. I think this is supposed to be set in Colorado and Wayne's cover is that he is visiting from Utah, interestingly his character makes a point of not drinking, but film is otherwise ambiguous vis-a-vie Mormonism. **

Roxanne (1987)

 'Roxanne' is another movie I watched for the podcast. Steve Martin stars in and penned this update of Edmond Rostand's 1897 work 'Cyrano de Bergerac'. Martin plays the soulful but comically large nosed fire chief of a Washington state resort community, Daryl Hannah a visiting astronomer and titular love interest, Rick Rossovich the handsome claude through whom Martin finds himself vicariously romancing his muse. 

This is a solid comedy and works as such, but excels through its subtleties and sense of mood, little extra bits of complexity to the lead characters, and being about something more then cheap laughs from a prosthetic nose. This surprised me, would be worth revisiting. ***1/2

Dangerous When Wet (1953)

 With 'Dangerous When Wet' I decided it was finally time for me to see one of Esther William's aquamusicals (think Scarlett Johansson in 'Hail, Caesar'). Energy drink (Lequipep) promotor Jack Carson is training Arkansas girl William's to swim The English Channel. She is romanced by Fernando Lamas and has a longish dream sequence with cartoon characters Tom & Jerry. William Demarest plays William's father and in this movie he has three girls, one which is played by Barbara Whiting, daughter of the late Hooray for Hollywood' composer Richard A. Whiting. The original songs in this movie are by Johnny Mercer, whose 'I Got Out of Bed on the Right Side' is overplayed. Interesting as novelty. **

The Arrangement (1969)

For 'The Arrangement' Elia Kazan adapted and directs from his own 1967 novel of the same name. Kirk Douglas is an advertising man whose affair with Faye Dunaway leaves him unhinged. So it's like 'Mad Men' only shitty. Pretentious and scattered, some good work from the two leads but this drag of a film is weighed down by the general unlikability of nearly every character, middling supporting work (I'm talking to you Deborah Karr) and Kazan's desperate need to be relevant, by far his worst film. A dull blade of a movie, mid-life crises drivel. It made me kind of mad. * 

Big Daddy (1999)

I watched 'Big Daddy' on assignment for one of the new 'homework' episodes we are doing for the podcast. I was surprised how much I enjoyed this 90's Adam Sandler comedy. There was a casualness to it that I found likable, movie wasn't trying too hard, was good hearted and everyone seemed to be having a good time making it. I'd say this is probably my favorite 1990's Sandler film. **1/2

Death Spa (1989)

 The exploration fair 'Death Spa' delivers on what it promises, supple bodies in various states of undress and gruesome deaths. The ghost of the jealous wife of the owner of prosperous LA fitness club, possesses her twin brother and proceeds to wreck the business and try to off any pretty woman who might attract her widowers attention.

Uneven, but still better then it should be, 'Death Spa' is a surprisingly competent production, but had a lot of distribution problems which accounts for the movie being attributed copyright/release dates for 1987, 1988, 1989 and 1990 (I went with the year of it's first theatrical release, which was in Japan). 

Since the plot involves a computerized system running amok, 1986's 'Chopping Mall' serves as a good point of reference. I would say this film is a little better put together then the earlier film, if a little less fun. Still the batshit ending leaves things on a high note, and solicited from me the coveted 'big grin'. **

CODA (2021)

 Short for 'Child of Death Adults', CODA's win for best picture was the second most shocking thing to happen at this years Oscar ceremony. A remake of a 2014 French/Belgian co-production, CODA is set in Gloucester, Massachusetts and concerns a family of deaf fisherman with one hearing member. Rubi Rossi (an endearing Emilia Jones) signs up for choir her senior year to be near a boy she likes, choir director Eugenio Derbez quickly discovers that she is a supremely talented singer, and offers to help her get into a prestigious music school. This up ends things for her family who have come to depend on her hearing ability, and are unable to apricate a talent they only vaguely understand. 

'CODA' treads some well worn coming of age territory, but offers a unique enough twist on things to avoid becoming too trite. The material is further elevated by strong central performances from Jones, Derbez, and Marlee Matlin, and Troy Kotsur, who earns his best supporting actor Oscar here. The film is funny, heart warming,  and perhaps surprisingly unpretentious. Your mom would like 'CODA'. ***1/2

The Ballad of Cable Hougue (1970)

'The Ballad of Cable Houge' was director Sam Peckinpah's follow up to his mega hit, the famously violent 1969 western 'The Wild Bunch'. This movie kept things in western territory but both slowed them down and lightened them up. Prospector Jason Robards is left for dead in the Nevada desert by his partners, he stumbles upon the only source of water in 40 miles and decides to make it a stage stop. He befriends a lovely proustite (Stella Stevens) and a lecherous preacher (David Warner). Part comedy, part revenge movie, part philosophical ramblings, this ideocentric film took me a bit to sync with, but once I did I thoroughly enjoyed it. ***1/2